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Leonardo Maugeri

Leonardo Maugeri is currently an Associate with the Geopolitics of Energy Project and the Environment and Natural Resources Program at the Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

One of the world's foremost experts on oil, gas, and energy, Maugeri has been one of the most distinguished top managers of Eni, the largest Italian company, which is also ranked number 6 among the largest international oil companies. At Eni, he held the position of Senior Executive Vice President of Strategies and Development (2000–2010) and eventually became Executive Chairman of Polimeri Europa, Eni's petrochemical branch (March 2010–June 2011). In 2008, Maugeri promoted the strategic alliance between Eni and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which—among other outcomes—led to the establishment of the Eni-MIT Solar Frontiers Center in 2010.

Maugeri is recognized worldwide for his books and seminal articles about energy, as well as for his part-time activity as a lecturer in some of the most prestigious universities and think-tanks. Since the early 2000s, he was among the few who affirmed that the world's oil was neither running out nor approaching its "peak-production." He was also among the few who predicted the revolution of shale-gas and tight oil.

He has published four books on energy, among them, The Age of Oil: the Mythology, History, and Future of the World’s Most Controversial Resource (Praeger, 2006), which earned the Choice Price in the United States in 2007 and was translated into eleven languages. His latest book—Beyond the Age of Oil: The Myths and Realities of Fossil Fuels and Their Alternatives—waspublished in the United States in March 2010.

Mr. Maugeri has also written several articles that appeared in Foreign Affairs, Science, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes,Scientific American, Oil & Gas Journal, and The Review of Environmental Economics and Policy.

Mr. Maugeri has been a Visiting Scholar at MIT (2009–2010) and a member of MIT's External Energy Advisory Board. He also serves as an International Counselor of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (Washington, D.C.) and as a member of the Global Energy Advisory Board of Accenture, and he is a senior fellow of the Foreign Policy Association (New York).

2014

In 2012, when many energy experts argued that oil production had peaked, Leonardo Maugeri published “Oil: The Next Revolution,” which forecast a glut of oil and collapsing prices in the next several years. His prediction proved prescient. Now, as analysts look past today’s oil-market drama to a near future of robust liquefied natural gas exports, Maugeri is again challenging conventional wisdom. The long-hoped-for and hyped-up gas market, he concludes, will disappoint.

“Falling Short: A Reality Check for Global LNG Exports” details the new findings by Maugeri, a former oil industry executive who is now an associate with the Geopolitics of Energy project at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

Italian energy economist Leonardo Maugeri has been getting attention lately for his 2012 prediction that growing oil supply capacity “could lead to a glut of overproduction and a steep dip in oil prices.” In October, he declared victory. In an interview, the associate at Harvard’s Belfer Center told the Globe how he made his forecast and how long low oil prices could last.

Due to the tensions between Russia and Ukraine, as well as to the instability of Libya, the EU is facing once again a high level of energy vulnerability that proves how poor and inconsistent its energy policies have been. For almost 15 years now, Brussels has been devoting its efforts to liberalizing the downstream energy market, aiming in particular at fostering competition in gas distribution and power generation. It also set rigid standards in order to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 2020, strongly supporting the development of renewables. Coupled with the economic crisis, these actions have created excess capacity in gas distribution and power generation, which in turn has brought investors in these sectors to their knees, without offering a solution to the underlying security problem: Absent abundant and competitive supply, the European gas market remains at the mercy of those that control the raw material.

In my 2012 study “Oil, the Next Revolution”, I stressed something that no one was seeing at that time (and much later as well). As summed up by the opening sentence of the study:

“Contrary to what most people believe, oil supply capacity is growing worldwide at such an unprecedented level that it might outpace consumption. This could lead to a glut of overproduction and a steep dip in oil prices.”

2013

The big international oil companies are going through a crisis little noticed by analysts and the markets. It is a crisis of results and of vision.

Simply put, the majors — companies like Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell and BP — aren’t growing. They have discovered relatively little oil in recent years despite increasing investment. They also have lost their exclusive lock on the skills that made them indispensable to oil-producing countries.

A new study by Belfer Center Geopolitics of Energy researcher Leonardo Maugeri finds that oil production capacity is surging throughout the world, but the United States in particular will experience unprecedented output as a result of technological advances and some unique attributes. This increased production will not be without challenges, however, as the drilling industry adapts to this relatively new method and overall output depending greatly on price stability. In the end, the U.S. may yet still import oil from other countries. The findings by Maugeri, a former oil industry executive who is now a fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center, are based on an original field-by-field analysis of the world’s major oil formations and exploration projects.

A study just released by Belfer Center researcher Leonardo Maugeri finds that the shale oil revolution taking place in the United States could result in the tripling of shale oil output to five million barrels a day by 2017, likely making the U.S. the top oil producer in the world in just a few years. The study by Maugeri, a Roy Family Fellow working with the Belfer Center's Geopolitics of Energy project, looked at whether the surge in shale oil production is just a temporary bubble or an event capable of significantly altering the U.S.—and possibly global—energy outlook.

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